Border Town Girl

by John D. MacDonald

  He unlocked the back end and took out a screwdriver and an adjustable wrench.

  “Would you know where they hide stuff on a car?”

  She didn’t answer him. He shrugged, released the hood catch and shoved the hood up. The wave of motor heat struck him. He stared at the motor for a time. He didn’t know the characteristics of the drug, but he imagined it was a crystalline substance. Motor heat wouldn’t do it much good probably. It was probably somewhere in the body of the car.

  He told her to get out of the car. She didn’t move, didn’t look at him. He took her wrist and pulled her out. She walked woodenly over to a patch of grass under one of the trees and sat down with her back to him.

  Lane began to sweat from exertion as he yanked the seats out. He examined them carefully but could see no evidence that they had been tampered with. Then he lay on his back and peered up under the dash.

  It took him an hour to find the answer. The simplicity of it made him angry. They had merely removed the inside panel from the left-hand door. The long sausage-like package wrapped in pale yellow oilskin was against the bottom of the door below the window mechanism. He took it out and held it, trying to guess its weight. Close to ten pounds. Nine, probably. He remembered the figure for the number of grams in a pound. Seven thousand sixteen. Nine pounds would be about sixty-three thousand grams. That would mean about four dollars a grain retail to the addict, if the girl hadn’t lied to him about its value.

  He put the package aside and replaced the panel, then put the seats back in. He tossed the package onto the front seat, went over to Diana and offered her a cigarette. She took it silently and he lit hers and his own. He sat down near her.

  “Now I’ll tell you why this was a damn fool stunt,” he said.

  “Don’t strain yourself.”

  “In the first place, it’s easy to recognize the car. Look over at the plates.”

  She looked. “Why, they’re out of date!”

  “Sure they are. It doesn’t make any difference in Mexico. I was going to buy Texas plates. That makes the car stand out like a sore thumb. How far could we get? Do you think the hotel hasn’t given the cops that license number? I wrote it on the register when I checked in. Now here’s the second pitch. In this area either you’re on the main roads or you’re a dead duck. The secondary roads just aren’t there. It makes it awfully easy to block off a whole area. If we’d kept going, we wouldn’t have gotten out. Radio goes a lot faster than my red wagon.”

  “What can we do?” she asked hopelessly.

  “I’ve been giving that a lot of thought. I forgot about a witness across the border who can clear me. I was all kinds of a damn fool to let you stampede me into running. Running is always the worst thing you can do. I know. I’ve done too much running in the past. This is my first experience running from the law, though.”

  “Do you expect me to go back there?”

  “How can I say that? Lady, I don’t even know what your problems are. All I know about you is that you were in trouble, that in a weak moment I helped you out, that you’re mixed up in what I think is the most vicious business in the world, and that when the squeeze came you dropped your Lorelei role and switched to blackmail. That covers the information. The only other thing I know about you is that you’re probably the most provocative-looking item I’ve ever seen in my life.”

  “You say such sweet things.”

  “I’m going to wait for dark and then I’m going back to Baker. You can do whatever you want—come with me, stay here, hitch-hike, or drop dead. I want to get all the way back into town and into the hotel before being stopped. That’s the only way I can clear myself of running out on a hotel bill. Then I’m turning that package over to the law and telling them everything I know.”

  “No, Lane. No, please.”

  He pushed her hand away. “No more of that, sugar. It doesn’t work any more.”

  She grew as solemn as a child. “But I have to get to New York with that package. While you were driving I was planning on what I would do, too. You see, it won’t do any good for me to be picked up and for that package to be taken. It won’t stop anything or cure anything. There’s a man in New York. I want to go to him. And I want to make a phone call so that after I take that package to him they’ll come for him and find it there. He laughs about them. They’ve been trying to get him for years. But he’s clever.”

  “Then,” said Lane, “Little Lord Fauntleroy told the fairy princess that he believed every last word that dripped from her dainty lips.”

  “It’s the truth!”

  He lay back and locked his hands behind his head. He squinted up at the blue sky through the live oak leaves. “Darling,” he said lazily, “I wouldn’t believe you if you were on your deathbed and I were your only child.”

  She called him a short name. He turned and grinned at her. “Now you’re in character again.”

  Tears filled her eyes and overflowed down her cheeks. She said in a small voice, “I’ll tell you a story. I suppose it’s a pretty common one. I wouldn’t know. It isn’t a pretty story and it has the corniest possible beginning. It started five years ago in one of those little upstate New York towns, the ones with the elms and the white houses. When I say corny, Lane, I really mean it. I sang in the church choir.”

  He turned up onto one elbow. “Oh, come now!” But he looked at her face and knew that she was telling the truth.

  “You know how it is,” she said. “You’re full of wanting and wanting and yet you don’t really know exactly what it is you want or how to go about getting it. Everything seems dull and you keep imagining yourself as a movie actress or something. Everybody says you’re pretty. I was a brunette then. And you think of the kind of man you want, and all of them in the town that aren’t married, they seem so young and dumb. Nothing to them.

  “Then a band came to town to play for a big dance, I went with a boy and there was a fellow in the band. He played a trumpet. Whenever I was on the floor I could feel him watching me. When I looked at him it was as though we shared some kind of secret we couldn’t talk about. It made me crazy to find out what the secret was. Oh, he wasn’t good-looking. He was nearly bald and he wasn’t tall, but there was something about him.

  “When the band left I followed them, on a coach. It was like that. They let me sing with them and they didn’t pay much because I was green and I had a lot to learn. When we were in New York the regular girl singer who had been sick came back to work. I couldn’t go home then. It was too late to go home. The trumpet player went with another band and they went out to the coast and I didn’t have enough money to follow them. I guess he didn’t want me to, anyway.

  “You learn a lot when you have to learn fast. And the biggest thing I learned was that my voice was really no good. No good at all. That’s a hard thing to learn, Lane. Then George came along. He was the sort of man I’d dreamed about back in the small town. Tall and dark, with a nice crooked smile. He could order wines and he drove a big car and everybody gave him a table as soon as he went into a place. When it was too late I found out what kind of business he was in. By then I couldn’t leave him. And just the other day I found out that there isn’t any goodness in him at all. Nothing but cruelty. Now I want to hurt him.”

  “This George,” Lane said, “he sent you down here to pick up that package? Why?”

  “He’s been a little worried for a long time. He was afraid that one of the regular people might be trapped by the law. He thought they might not think I’d be trusted for a thing like this. But George knew he could trust me. Then somehow Christy, who works for him, had someone steal the money I was going to use to pay for it. Then George was angry and he had to send Christy down with more money. I knew that George was getting tired of me, but I wouldn’t admit it to myself. So he told Christy that he wasn’t interested any more and he could have me if he wanted.”

  “Wouldn’t that be up to you?”

  “Not in George’s crowd, Lane. Not in a group working ou
tside the law like they do. The rules are different. Now do you believe me when I tell you that all I want to do is frame George? I don’t care what happens after that.”

  Lane Sanson shut his eyes against the sun glare. He could hear the soft metronome of her weeping.

  “There’s a better way,” he said. “We’ll both go back and you tell those people what you want to do. Let them rig it for you. If they want the goods on this George character, they’ll play ball with you.”

  “They won’t trust me,” she said in a small voice.

  “That’s a chance you have to take.”

  “I’m frightened, Lane.”

  “Of what?”

  “Prison. I dream of it sometimes. All gray walls and gray cotton and it’s always raining and big bells ringing. Do this, do that. Years and years, Lane.”

  She flung herself toward him, her weight against his chest, her head under his chin, and the sobs shook her and her tears scalded his throat. He put his arm around her and tried to comfort her.

  When at last the tempo of the sobs decreased until they were only great shuddering breaths that came at long intervals, he said, “So we’ll go back as soon as it’s dark?”

  Her voice was muffled. “Anything you say, Lane.”

  “To keep you amused,” he said bitterly, “I shall now tell you a long story of a promising young citizen named Lane Sanson who, as far as reports go, apparently dropped dead several years ago. It is a long amusing story about a book and a blonde wife and a problem involving integrity.”

  “Tell me,” she whispered.

  8

  WHEN TOMKINTON, CLAVNA AND THE RANGER, who was named Vance, came into the third-floor room all Christy could do was look at them with his small alert blue eyes.

  Tomkinton came quickly back from the bathroom. He checked the top drawers of the bureau. He whistled softly. “Bad, bad news, Clav. The bird has flown.”

  Clavna cursed with great feeling. “Oh, that’s fine! That’s great! We can probably get jobs as ribbon clerks. You had to be the one to say we didn’t have to cover the whole joint because there was no reason for her to run.”

  “Don’t try to pass the buck to me,” Tomkinton said hotly.

  “No need to get in a fuss,” Vance said. “This is a tough town to run away from. I’ll put the lid on.” He picked up the room phone.

  As he picked it up there was a loud scream of rubber in front of the hotel. Tomkinton ran to the window. A red Buick convertible, several years old, rocked down through traffic. He squinted but the car was too far away for him to read the license.

  “Go down to the lobby and see what you can find out, Clav,” he directed.

  Vance, on the phone, was saying, “You already got the description. The Saybree woman. Yeah. Give them the word at the bridge and tell Hal that I think it’s hot enough to radio up the line for the usual road block. That leaves the airport and the bus station.”

  He hung up and grinned at Tomkinton. He was a lean man with a saddle-leather face and the ranger uniform sat well on his shoulders. “Least we got us a murderer if you boys got the right dope on this guy on the floor. He is the one you called Christy, isn’t he?”

  “That’s him,” Tomkinton said. Tomkinton was a young, round-faced man with the look of an affable bank teller. He walked over to Christy. He said softly, “Killing Shaymen was a mistake, friend. A bad mistake. Not up to your usual style.”

  He took out his knife and cut the nylon. He yanked the towel from Christy’s mouth. It was stained with blood where it had touched Christy’s lips. Christy coughed and moistened his lips with his tongue. “My wrists are killing me,” he muttered.

  “Where did the girl go?”

  “I don’t know. She left with a guy. Tall fella with a little bandage on his head. I never saw him before… The two of them busted me with a glass when I wasn’t looking. How about these wrists?”

  Clavna trotted through the open door. “Hey, she left with a guy named Lane Sanson. He had a room on the second floor. They went down the fire escape and took off in a red Buick convertible. Here’s the license number. I wrote it down.”

  Vance took the slip of paper and picked up the phone again. As he waited he said, “This’ll make it easier.”

  Tomkinton frowned. “Lane Sanson. Lane Sanson. I’ve heard that name before. Wait a minute. Newspaper guy. War correspondent. Hey, he wrote a book! I saw the movie.”

  Vance was talking softly over the phone. Clavna grinned. “A newspaper screwball. Boy, that’s all we need. What the hell do you think he thought he was doing to leave here with the Saybree woman?”

  “Maybe chivalry isn’t dead,” Tomkinton said.

  “He’ll get chivalried, all right,” Clavna said, his thin dark face alight with wry amusement. “He’ll get a bellyful.”

  “Especially if they have the junk with them,” Tomkinton said.

  Vance hung up. “All over but the shouting,” he said. “That car’ll be grabbed within two hours unless it sprouts wings. Already they got a report that it’s heading east.”

  “How about taking this wire off me?” Christy whined.

  Tomkinton knelt by him and untwisted the wire around his ankles first. Christy sighed and worked his thick legs. Finally the wrists were free. Christy got onto his hands and knees, then lumbered up onto his feet. He massaged his big white hands, inspected the wire cuts on his wrists.

  “You guys are confusing me, talking about Shaymen,” he said. “I know the guy. I saw him in New York maybe three weeks ago. If somebody bumped him, it wasn’t me.”

  “You killed him last night,” Tomkinton said.

  “Nuts! Last night I was here, in Texas. How could I kill a guy in New York?”

  “You killed him here.”

  Christy looked at Tomkinton with blank amazement. “Here? Shaymen here? Well, I’ll be damned! What do you suppose he was doing here? Spying on me or something?”

  “What did you come here for, Christy?” Clavna asked. “As if we didn’t know.”

  “Well, boys, it’s like this. Miss Saybree run out on the boss. He was worried about her. He found out she was here. So he sent me down to talk her into coming back. He couldn’t get away himself. You know how it is.”

  “He won’t be getting away for some time,” Clavna said.

  Christy was motionless for long seconds. “What do you mean by that?” he asked in a low voice.

  “You should keep up on these things, Christy,” Tomkinton said, smiling cheerfully. “The whole crew has been picked up. George, Al, Denny, Myron, Looba, Stace. Every one of them. And this isn’t just one of those suspicious deals. This is the works. Right down the line. They haven’t got a million to one chance of squeaking out. And neither have you. We’ll let the State of Texas take care of you for the murder, though. That’ll be the simplest, cleanest way.”

  “I don’t know anything about no murder,” Christy said.

  “Not even,” Tomkinton said, “with Clavna here tailing you and seeing you get picked up in front of a movie house in a car and noting down the license number and then Vance telling us it was Shaymen’s car, found this morning with his body beside it?”

  Vance jingled the cuffs. He walked over to Christy. “Hold ’em out,” he said calmly.

  Christy numbly stuck his big hands out. Vance started to snap the open cuffs down on the thick wrists. Christy’s hands flicked wide apart, then clamped down onto Vance’s wrists. The white, wet-lipped face had gone completely mad. He flung Vance at Clavna like an awkward doll. The flying body smashed Clavna against the wall and, as they slid down in a heap, Christy reached Tomkinton in one bearlike bound.

  Tomkinton was trying to scuttle backward and snatch the Police Positive from its awkward place in his right hip pocket at the same time. As he yanked it free, tearing the pocket, Christy’s right fist clubbed against the side of his head like an oak knot. The blow that knocked Tomkinton cleanly through the open bathroom door and sent him sliding across the tile to stop against th
e tub, fractured consciousness the way a piece of string is broken.

  Vance, prone across the legs of the unconscious Clavna, was groggily shifting his revolver to his left hand, having found that there was no life in the right one. He fired once as he saw the heavy shoes swinging toward his eyes, swinging in slow motion, blotting out all the light in the world.

  The slug tore through the top of Christy’s right shoulder, just above the collarbone. As an after-echo of the shot he heard it smack into the wall behind him. A warmth and wetness ran down his chest and his back under the dark wool suit coat. It drove him back a half-step. His right arm was still functioning. He snatched up the revolver from beside Vance’s hand and stuffed it inside his belt. He had never carried or used a gun. It always made him feel weak and sick even to look at one.

  He opened the door and ran out into the hall. He was halfway down to the second floor when he heard steps coming along the second floor to the stairway—running steps.

  Christy turned and stared up at the third floor. As the steps came up behind him he said excitedly, “I heard a shot up there!”

  The ranger ran by him without a word. Christy turned and went down to the second floor, then down the next flight. He slowed as he reached the lobby. He walked out the front door onto the sidewalk. A state police car was parked near the entrance. It was empty and the door was open.

  Christy walked steadily down toward the bridge. The midmorning sun was hot on the back of his neck. He could feel his shirt sticking to him.

  He made himself smile and nod at the U.S. officials. “Just going over for a coupla hours,” he called.

  The man waved him on. He paid the pedestrian toll to the Mexican guard in the middle of the bridge. The sun was a hot weight behind him, pushing him along. He touched his shirt pocket and felt the crispness of the bills he had taken from Shaymen’s billfold. Not much, but maybe it would be enough.